


New Year's

by eponine119



Category: Lost
Genre: DHARMA Initiative, F/M, First Kiss, New Year's Eve, New Year's Kiss, New Years, the 70s
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-21
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:15:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27650533
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eponine119/pseuds/eponine119
Summary: Juliet has plans for New Year's
Relationships: Juliet Burke/James "Sawyer" Ford
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	New Year's

New Year's  
by eponine119  
Sept 6 2020

New Year's Eve is in three days, and Juliet is thinking about kissing Sawyer. At midnight, in particular, but also just in general. 

She still isn't sure what to make of this weird thing that exists between them. It's an uneasy friendship, colored by attraction. She knows she's not the only one feeling this way. She catches him looking at her sometimes, and it's there in his eyes. The way he glances down at her lips when she's speaking. The way he's so careful not to touch her. 

Juliet wishes she understood him better. She also knows that an obligatory kiss at midnight isn't going to suddenly open the door to some kind of relationship between them. She can secretly hope for it, but she knows better. A lot better. She does think that maybe it will get it out of her system, so she can stop thinking about it and yearning for it in daydreams and falling-asleep fantasies. She won't have to wonder what it will be like. 

…

They sit around in the living room after dinner, as usual, because there isn't much else to do. Jin is digging through the records like there's one he's looking for. Miles sprawls sideways in the chair, drinking directly from the wine bottle. Sawyer's got an open book in his hand, but he's not reading it. Juliet's feet are tucked up underneath her, and she's thinking that she's happy in this moment, in this little group. 

“Who are you going to kiss at midnight?” Miles asks. His face is flushed and his eyes are dark. He seems determined to finish off the wine. 

“That's something people plan out ahead of time?” Sawyer scoffs. 

“Yes,” Miles says with an enthusiastic nod of his head. He looks at Juliet, expecting her to back him up. 

But she can't say anything, because she has been making plans. She glances at Sawyer, and his face is locked down, frowning. The line between his eyebrows is deep. He doesn't look at her. So she looks at Miles. “What about you?” she asks him, since it was his question. 

“There's a lot of cute chicks around here,” Miles says. “Maybe I'll get 'em all.” 

Juliet smiles, amused by the image in her head of Miles bouncing around like Bugs Bunny. She looks at Jin, thinking he must be missing his wife. But he doesn't even look like he's listening to them. 

“What's the point of it anyway,” Sawyer says. 

“Tradition,” Juliet offers up. 

“Screw tradition,” he glares. 

She looks at him quizzically, wondering what he hates so much about New Year's. But she knows she'll never figure it out unless he tells her, and he doesn't seem inclined to. That doesn't mean he won't – more than once he's declared he's not going to talk about something, only to crack open a few minutes later and tell her all about it. He could also just be grumpy and ornery in general tonight. He could need more wine, or his glasses, or nothing at all. That's the beauty of Sawyer. 

“Buncha high school shit anyway,” Sawyer concludes. 

Juliet's about to agree with him, because there's a lot about Dharma living that reminds her of high school and college – communal living, the cafeteria, there being nowhere to go and nothing to do, leading to these evenings of sitting around with friends, talking about nothing. But Sawyer closes his book and huffs, then stomps out of the room. The back door to the house slams behind him. 

She closes her mouth. 

“Let him go,” Miles says, with a wild wave of his hand. He looks at her again. “You know what I'm talking about, though, right, Jules?” 

She wants to tell him not to call her that. She wants to get up and go after Sawyer, but it seems too obvious. So she says coolly, “Of course.” 

“A-ha!” Jin cries. Apparently he's found what he was looking for. He passes the disk to Miles, who puts it on the turntable. The two of them squabble about precisely which track it is Jin wants, and then decide to let the album play from the beginning. 

Juliet swipes the wine and straightens up the living room around them, shoving the scattered records back onto the shelf. She tosses the empty wine bottle into the trash, wondering how long it will take her to lose the instinct to recycle it. They've been in the 70s for months. 

She walks outside. The night is still and dark, with strange stars overhead. She breathes in the pleasantly jungle-scented air, listening to the silence. Sawyer leans against the post of the porch. She catches the scent of cigarette smoke as he lifts his boot to crush out the stub. He looks at her. “Waitin' for the lecture,” he says, lifting his hands like an invitation. 

“So wait,” she advises. She nods, looking at him. “You want to talk about it?” 

“Talk about what,” he grumbles, looking down, letting his hair fall into his eyes. Then he cuts his gaze sharply over at her again, almost an accusation. 

“New Year's,” she says. He gives her an eyeroll. “Because until you do, the story in my head that I'm going with is that some pretty girl in high school broke your heart at a party.” 

“Couldn't be more wrong,” he says. “As usual.” 

She knows. That's why she said it. To get him to tell her how she's wrong. It just might work. 

“I didn't think we'd still be here,” he says. His scowl is gone and he looks at her honestly. “You get that, right?” 

She takes a deep breath, and then she nods. 

“All this. The island. 1975,” he says. “It's all so normal, but we ain't.” 

“Nothing about this island is normal, James,” she says. 

“The Others have New Year's Eve parties?” 

She hates being reminded that they were once enemies, and she knows that's why he does it. He's reminding himself, too. There are so many ways to not belong. “Of course,” she replies, softly. She waits for him to ask her who she kissed last year, but he doesn't. 

Juliet can't help thinking about it, anyway. She'd turned to leave the party before the countdown started, because she didn't want to be a part of it. She didn't want to admit to herself that her lover was going to kiss his wife and she barely even cared. But she mistimed it, and then Ben stepped out of one of the rooms in front of her, and even though she wanted to turn and run, she couldn't, because she still had to live there and there was no escape. There was no way he could have planned it or orchestrated it – it just happened – and she had to let him put his mouth on her, keeping her lips firmly closed.

“You got somebody all picked out, Juliet?” Sawyer asks, pulling her back into the present. 

She can't lie to him and say no. So she says, “Goodnight.” She wants to touch him, but she doesn't want to feel his flinch, so she doesn't. She wants him to put his hand on her arm, the way he used to, but that doesn't happen either. 

…

The party isn't so bad. There's a champagne fountain that wobbles precariously, and the inherent danger of it is a perfect centerpiece. 

“It's gonna fall,” Miles says. 

“The only question is when,” Juliet agrees. 

“Takin' wagers,” Sawyer suggests. 

“You'd think a bunch of scientists would be able to stack glasses and have them be stable,” Juliet says. “But you'd be wrong.” 

They all hold their breath and watch the wobble intensify as Rosie grabs a glass, but once again the disturbance subsides and everything remains intact. 

They pull themselves away from the spectacle and mingle. Jin is a surprisingly good dancer, and doesn't mind dancing by himself. Juliet talks to her friends and coworkers, but her eyes follow Sawyer, keeping track of him and where he goes. She hates how calculating it feels.

By the time it's nearly midnight, the glasses still haven't toppled. It's almost disappointing. The four of them stand together when the countdown starts. Juliet's heart ramps up, and as the numbers reach one, she turns to Sawyer, who is standing next to her. She raises her chin and meets his eyes. 

He looks at her as the cheering starts. His forehead wrinkles. Then he turns and walks away. 

Juliet is crushed. That's what this feeling is, she thinks, with her shoulders sagging. Totally and utterly crushed, as she watches his back retreating through the celebrating crowd. 

“Hey,” Miles says, and plants one on her. It's wet, and there's tongue. 

She's too surprised to do anything but put her hands on his shoulders. “Oh,” she says, when it ends. She didn't know. She wants to wipe her mouth off on her hand but she can't. 

To his credit, Miles takes it all in and seems to realize it as well. “Saving you from embarrassment,” he says. “You and me both. Not having anyone to, you know.” He's backing away. “I'm going to stop talking now.” 

“Yeah,” Juliet agrees, and they go their separate ways. She is embarrassed. Sawyer looked at her, and knew what she was going to do, and he turned away from her. 

Her stomach feels inside-out. She thinks about Miles, and about Ben last year. All the wrongness and not-wanting that she felt. And she knows now that's how Sawyer thinks about her. Whatever thing she thought was going on, whatever she thought she saw in his eyes, it must have all been in her head. She feels like an idiot, and it hurts. 

She finds something strong to drink, swallowing it and then coughing. Her head turns light but everything still hurts. She kind of thinks she's going to cry, and crying is not something that she does anymore, so she wraps her arms around herself to try to hold it in, and heads for the door. 

Behind her there's a huge crash of breaking glass. She doesn't even turn to look, knowing it was the fountain, finally, collapsing under the weight of its own existence.

She closes the door and leans on it, taking big gasping breaths of the night air, like she's been running, like she just escaped something terrible. 

“Tell me, Blondie.” Sawyer's voice comes out of the darkness. “You knock that table over? Couldn't take it anymore?” 

“No,” she says. “I wasn't anywhere near it.” 

“Don't mean you didn't want to.” 

She did want to. The promise of destruction always calls to her. “I didn't know you were out here,” she says, and peels herself up from the door, ready to make another escape. 

“'s okay,” he says. The light from indoors spills through the windows and catches him in silhouette. He's leaning against the porch post, but he's not smoking. She wonders what he's thinking about. “You and the ghost whisperer,” he says, with a put-on surprised tone. “Boy howdy, should have seen that coming.” 

“Friends kiss at midnight,” she says, stiffly, wishing that she meant it. 

“Bullshit,” Sawyer says, and he looks at her. 

The look makes it hard for her to breathe, because it's another one of those looks that makes her think that he wants her. She looks right back. Her lips feel kind of numb as she asks, “Is that why you rejected me?” 

He scoffs. 

She should let it drop, but she won't. She might as well pile up more regrets for the morning. “James.” 

“That right there is why,” he says. 

Her chest aches as though she's literally being crushed to death underneath something heavy. It's because she knows his name? Because she calls him by it? She doesn't understand. 

“You think I don't see it? All the little looks you give me? You watchin' me this whole night, gears tickin' up in that head of yours as you make your little plans?” 

Juliet wishes she would die, in this moment. None of Ben's petty humiliations hurt like this, because she didn't give a shit what Ben thought of her. But this is James. 

“You think I'm blind, woman?” he asks, turning to face her. She can't look away, and with the door at her back and him in front of her, there's nowhere to run. “You think I don't want you?” 

“What?” She thinks that she heard him wrong, because all of this has been about how much her feelings for him disgust him, and now she doesn't understand at all. 

He answers her question by closing the space between them. His hand slides across her face to cradle the back of her skull as his lips meet hers. They're soft in a way she never expected, and there's no anger or disgust in it at all. He makes a satisfied little sound and opens his eyes, looking unfocusedly at her. He kisses her again, his body pinning hers against the door. 

He releases her, and her knees wobble like the champagne fountain. “I am so confused right now,” she says. 

“I wanted it to mean somethin'.” 

“And does it?” 

He grins at her. “Yeah.” His hand rests on her waist, hot on top of the thin cotton of her blouse. His fingers move, his thumb stroking up and down. 

She wants to press him on it, to ask him what it means, but she doesn't. 

“Wait'll you hear my resolutions,” he teases her. “You're gonna like 'em.” 

She kisses him again, because she wants to, because she can. He kisses her back, and his hips press into hers. She wants so much more. “Happy New Year, James,” she says softly. 

“Happy New Year, Juliet,” he replies, looking at her with darkened eyes, and it sounds more like a promise. 

End


End file.
